radford@calgary.UUCP (Radford Neal) (03/18/85)
Does anyone know what the cost of certifying an Ada implementation is,
assuming it is perfect? I don't know much about this, but I would assume
you don't get to run the tests yourself, hence have to pay them to, etc.
Radford Neal
The University of Calgarycjh@petsd.UUCP (Chris Henrich) (03/20/85)
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As I understand things, to "certify" a compiler is to
state "we think we have a valid compiler." It can be done by
the people producing the compiler, and does not require action
by AJPO. (Prudent people will not claim to "certify" before
they are pretty sure they *can* validate.) To "validate" a
compiler is to subject it to a large number of test programs,
under the supervision of someone from the AJPO validation
office, who is to make sure that the system for which
validation is being claimed re{lly is the one that compiled
and ran the test programs, etc. etc. Validation is a big,
expensive operation.
Regards,
Chris
--
Full-Name: Christopher J. Henrich
UUCP: ..!(cornell | ariel | ukc | houxz)!vax135!petsd!cjh
US Mail: MS 313; Perkin-Elmer; 106 Apple St; Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Phone: (201) 870-5853bob@sdcsvax.UUCP (Robert Hofkin) (03/22/85)
Indeed, certification is one of the steps in the validation process. The vendor runs the test suite in-house, before the testers come out. Apparently the certification output is forwarded to the validation people; they want to clear up ambiguities before the official run. I'm not sure why this is; with validation at around $10,000 a shot [estimate--they don't seem to publicize the cost], you'd figure that developers would be REALLY SURE they got it right first! Last I heard, the "real" test suite may include programs not available during the certification phase. And yes, at this point every host X target X operating system needs a separate validation, and every validation must be renewed annually.
ekrell@ucla-cs.UUCP (03/24/85)
In article <313@calgary.UUCP> radford@calgary.UUCP (Radford Neal) writes: >Does anyone know what the cost of certifying an Ada implementation is, >assuming it is perfect? I don't know much about this, but I would assume >you don't get to run the tests yourself, hence have to pay them to, etc. > > Radford Neal > The University of Calgary In an Ada conference last year, someone from the AJPO gave a talk on the certification process and it was mentioned that the average cost was around $40,000. Among other things, you have to pay for their team to come to your site for the final tests. -- Eduardo Krell UCLA Computer Science Department ekrell@ucla-locus.arpa ..!{sdcrdcf,ihnp4,trwspp,ucbvax}!ucla-cs!ekrell
drm1@vrdxhq.UUCP (Donn Milton) (03/27/85)
> Indeed, certification is one of the steps in the validation process. > The vendor runs the test suite in-house, before the testers come out. > Apparently the certification output is forwarded to the validation > people; they want to clear up ambiguities before the official run. I'm > not sure why this is; with validation at around $10,000 a shot > [estimate--they don't seem to publicize the cost], you'd figure that > developers would be REALLY SURE they got it right first! Last I heard, > the "real" test suite may include programs not available during the > certification phase. > > And yes, at this point every host X target X operating system needs a > separate validation, and every validation must be renewed annually. There seems to be some confusion about the terms "certification", "validation", etc. We have recently been through the validation process, and the story is this: The term "certification", which used to mean that the vendor claimed to have passed the ACVC test suite, no longer has any official status. The term "prevalidation" is used to describe the process whereby a vendor runs the ACVC test suite at its own site and sends the results to an Ada Validation Facility (AVF). The AVF reviews the results, and when it agrees that all applicable tests have been passed, the compiler can be described as "prevalidated". The term "validation" is used to describe the on-site execution of the tests under the supervision of AVF personnel. The AVF will only perform a validation on a compiler that has been prevalidated. When that AVF is satisfied that the compiler has passed all applicable tests, the compiler can be described as "validated". Compilers must be revalidated annually for a vendor to continue to describe them as validated. Currently, validations performed by the AVF at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base cost about $15,000. Donn Milton Verdix Corporation